More on Xbox 360 backwards compatibility
by James Ransom-Wiley 
{ Jun 8th 2005 at 12:52PM }
By now we've all heard that the Xbox 360 will support "most top selling Xbox games". And in truth, we're willing to bet that most of the entire catalogue for the Xbox will run on the 360. Basically, it's been worked out so that the 360 will emulate the original Xbox to an extent that all single layer games will be supported. For popular multi-layered games, Microsoft will install a number of patches on the preloaded hard drive and has promised to release more depending on the level of demand.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Paul @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
This is cool, but I'd be willing to bet that the majority of people only care about Halo 2 on XBL. Does anyone know or have any predictions on how Xbox Live will work with the emulated games (or if it will at all). I know many games that I have bought for Xbox solely for playing online...so I think it would be a shame to only have offline modes available for these games on Xbox 360.
Dude 101 @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
first!
Eric Pobirs @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
There is absolutely nothing in that article that wasn't covered by major sites during E3. why do you bother with these non-stories?
This 'layers' business obscures the problem. There are games that use the DirectX APIs for all hardware addressing. Those will be easy to emulate. There are other games that bypss the APIs to gain performance by addressing the XGPU directly. Those are more difficult as they get into Nvidia's proprietary IP and specific legal requirements must be followed to create emulation of those functions without Nvidia licensing. But you don't create separate versions of the emulator for individual games. You just keep improving the the base emulator. Once you have one game covered every other game using that same approach will be addressed as well.
The only time you'd want game specific blocks of code would be for a pre-translated chunk of the game code itself. Having that on hand speeds up the process a great deal, particularly for the most difficult games' performance needs.
Unlike Apple, the Xbox 360's support has to be for every aspect of the Xbox hardware used by games. OTOH, the Xbox library is less than a thousand items with fairly similar structures since they're pretty much all patterned around DirectX. This makes the job of testing every item reasonable but very time consuming.
Paul @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
dude101 you arent first, and youre a complete retard for posting just to say that
Hans @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
He was first, I'm pretty sure of it. When I clicked on the comments it was his comment I saw.
ArC @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Eric, the story is that MS is licensing NVidia's XBox GPU for backwards compatibility reasons, as mentioned in the linked story. (Don't know why Joystiq didn't highlight that, as that actually was new news.)
Chris K @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
I still want to know if controllers will be compatible! I want to buy a Fanatec wheel for Forza, but I'm not going to buy it if it will be obsolete when the 360 comes out. Not for $150!
It's disappointing that nobody has said anything about controller compatibility, not even Fanatec, who has a big interest in giving customers a thumbs up.
logic @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
does anyone have a link to a list of games, broken down by number of layers?
The "That's Hot" Guy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
#8 yes. but i will not tell you who that person is.
Dmitri @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Who the hell cares about backwards compatibility. So let me get this straight, the first game anyone wants to play, is an old xbox game. How stupid.
The "That's Hot" Guy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Dimitri,
Your stupid! Yes, I know its "you're", moran. And, I also know it's "it's" and "moron."
Mike @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Since Microsoft announced a Holiday 05 release of 360 I have been holding out on buying an Xbox. With the announcement of backwards capability I know now where my money is going this holiday season. Some would say its stupid to play older games on a new machine but I would disagree. The initial launch of a console only has 1 or 2 real gems to own and it often takes months after for anything decent to show up, just look at the PSP everyone waiting for GTA and Death JR. Now with Xbox releasing FarCry and Half Life 2 this Summer I am willing to hold off and use these games to fill the void after the 360 initial launch of games. So I good job Microsoft and Now give us a standard HDMI and Digital audio port. Oh and maybe you could reach an agreement with Toshiba on the HD-DVD drive and we could have a real battle between the consoles.
Pete @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Not even on topic, but at www.gamespot.com, there is a poll:
Question:
So, did you run out and pre-order your Xbox 360 for fear of them running out?
Answers
You bet! I'm not missing out on the launch run.
(17%) 3703 votes
I think I'll wait for all the hullabaloo to die down, and get one sometime post-launch.
(37%) 7887 votes
I'm not interested in getting an Xbox 360.
(44%) 9429 VOTES!!!
Thought the 360 would have had more support; surprised me a bit. Did I miss something?
Mathias Pettersson @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
I agree with you Mike, I also intend to horde up some of the great titles coming late in the Xbox lifespan, to complement the two-or-so definates from the 360 launch release list.
I also think that it's a tad "chicken" of Microsoft not to take a stance in the DVD showdown.
Kane @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Well guys at micro$oft are not innovative now..
Ypu know revolution has same abilyty as that. So that isnt really anything cool. Its lame you know.
Now i understand why nintendo didnt want to say anyhting about revolutio before cos the others would copy the things they do...
Kane @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Well guys at micro$oft are not innovative now..
Ypu know revolution has same abilyty as that. So that isnt really anything cool. Its lame you know.
Now i understand why nintendo didnt want to say anyhting about revolutio before cos the others would copy the things they do...
Xelper @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
From Xbox-Scene:
Xbox360 Backward Compatibility: Microsoft will pay Nvidia royalties
>> From gamedaily.com:
[QUOTE]
Some details have trickled out, courtesy of Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter. In a recent research note, Pachter confirms that Microsoft "has agreed to pay a small royalty to Nvidia to allow the Xbox 360's ATI chipset to emulate the performance of the Nvidia chipset in reading certain Xbox games."
Apparently, for Xbox games that are written in a single layer (which MS management believes to be most of the Xbox library) the emulation should be pretty smooth. The smaller percentage of Xbox titles that are written in multiple layers will require "patches" (separate emulation programs) in order to work. Pachter says that Microsoft currently plans to sell the 360 with these patches already pre-loaded on the included 20GB hard drive. It is also conceivable that any additional patches for other Xbox games could be easily downloaded over Xbox Live.
[/QUOTE]
Xelper @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Quote: "I also think that it's a tad "chicken" of Microsoft not to take a stance in the DVD showdown."
Sony is betting on Blu-Ray for their project obviously, if blu-ray fails, sony fails. well its not thaat they fail, its just if they want to stay with Blu-Ray for the PS3, they have to outfit manufacturers with the proper hardware to create the CD's, losing MILLIONS.
Now if Microsoft was to make a foolish bet like that, they would also lose millions. And currently, its been stated that games probably wont use more than 3/4 of a DVD.
Mathias Pettersson@msn.com @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
They would lose money if the bet on the losing side. If they were to chose a side, that side would be that much stronger, and that much more likely to not be the losing side.
I understand that Microsoft (when they have their software vendor hat on) want to support whatever hardware prevails, but next gen DVD is in my opinion a big deal in a next gen console.
LaughingTarget @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
Given that the bulk of the data taken up on any given disk is in the form of pre-rendered movies, going with a Blu-Ray disk is pretty much a waste of time and may be a bad thing for gamers. All it would mean is developers now have more space to cram in even more pre-rendered cutscenes, which would push the concept of movies over actually playing the game to new heights that will rival the Xenosaga series.
The dual layer DVDs Microsoft uses hold around 9 gigs of space. For comparison, the biggest PC game out there (to my knowledge) is World of Warcraft, fully patched to the recent Battlegrounds inclusion, which runs 4.5 gigs. I can burn a completely uncompressed copy of World of Warcraft to a single layer DVD, let alone need an entire dual layer. Blu-Ray is irrelevant.
Pete @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
"Blu-Ray is irrelevant"
"going with a Blu-Ray disk is pretty much a waste of time and may be a bad thing for gamers."
Nothing against anyone with an opinion that is thorough, but I have to disagree with your comments. Your comment may be somewhat fundamentally flawed in that it is based on current gen and non-HD gaming notions. A current gen game on the XBOX can go up to 9 gigs, if what you said is correct. Well, if we are moving into the next generation of graphics and High Definition, those 9 gigs might be a little unacceptable 2-3 years into the gaming realm. Blu-ray does have a toxic dump worth of space, but who is to say that games will not need that much space for the next gen or HD gaming? Even DVD is making HD-DVD's to accomodate for the upgrade in digital quality. I agree that Sony is taking a chance with Blu-Ray, but that's what the PlayStation has been about, risks to 'change the game'. They took a risk by jumping into the gaming business in the 90s and dominated, they followed up with a risk on DVD's when CD's was all a developer needed with the PS2. It's now time for Sony to take another risk on what the future wants. And, If I know Sony, not all games will be on Blu-Ray, just the games that need it. You have to think outside of the box, people. The future of gaming may need more capacity for their games, think about it.
Tom @ Dec 18th 2005 9:59PM
The Xbox 360 is going to be by far the better of the two consoles, until revolution shows up. Gamecube was a dissapointment and that is why I am buying a 360. Most of the games will be the same anyway, like ps2 and xbox games were similar, so get the one which has the better internet capabilities and made by one of the best computer making companies in the world not sony who just try and make their console look good. Oh and if you by the "CORE" system for xbox360 you will have to be a 20gb hard drive to make it backwards capable. I know xbox360 is gonna rock just look at some of the games coming out for it. AWESOME!!